Integrated poultry farmers house broiler breeders to produce eggs, incubate the eggs at their own hatchery, and grow out offspring until slaughter. Revenues are largely based on the amount of produced poultry meat minus the costs resulting from feeding the broiler breeders, operating the hatchery, feeding the offspring, and other costs (e.g., poultry housing).
An embryo is dependent for normal growth and development on supply of all required nutrients within the egg. It is known that the supply of nutrients in the egg originates in the maternal nutrition and breeder hen metabolism. When changes can be made in the maternal diet which will influence embryo development and offspring growth, it may be much more cost efficient than changing the offspring diet to improve performance. For example, European Patent Application No. EP2358214 titled “USE OF CANTHAXANTHIN AND/OR 25-OH D3 FOR IMPROVED HATCHABILITY IN POULTRY” assigned to DSM IP Assets B.V. is directed to the use of canthaxanthin for improved hatchability in poultry.
One broiler breeder hen may produce around one hundred broiler chickens per year. Thus, a small improvement in offspring performance, due to a change in breeder nutrition, can have a major impact on the yield resulting from the offspring.
Similarly, the success and profit for animal breeders raising cattle, swine, sheep, and many other animals depends largely upon the ability to produce large numbers of viable offspring. It is, therefore, desirable to increase the birth rate by insuring that a larger percentage of fertilized eggs mature into viable offspring.